Community Building (Transformative and Otherwise)

Mon May 16 13:06:03 PDT 2005

Hi Harrison,
It was during a Community Building facilitators workshop I attended in the
UK (CBiB) that i first came across OS. The occasion gave me the not to be
missed experience of sitting in a break out space all on my lonesome. My
topic "What happens next". I had in fact posted the question as to what
happens after the Community Building Event ends. Nobody knew and nobody
really wanted to face the issue much at the time.

I would still be a fan of CB for the reason that it can provide the
experience of community when there is no theme available around which to
open space. It provides an opportunity for individuals to interact with
people who are very often strangers in a way that the presence of a
facilitator or guru or motivational speaker cannot provide. It's not for
everyone. The sense of community, be it pseudo or real, can be addictive
and for some there is no need of anything after. The sense of shared
experience or community helps them on their journey and probably helps most
participants. My experience was with CB in Britain which may not be as it
is in the states.

It's a bit like trying to access the essence of something and then leaving
out the "thing". No "thing" changes except the person having the
experience. I suspect that in many cases of OS, it is the same.

Regards
Shay

At 14:54 14/05/2005, you wrote:
>When I first read Scott Peck's work ("A Road Less Traveled", "A Different
>Drum", etc) I experienced a deep resonance and profound learning. This
>fellow knew what he was talking about and had spent no small amount of time
>considering what he had to say. With the possible exception of Martin Buber,
>Peck understood and expressed the deep elements of community and
>connectedness better than just about anybody that I knew. And yet, over the
>years (he started writing in the early '80s) as I witnessed his and his
>associates' attempts to apply these understandings I felt a growing sense of
>disconnect. It was not that Peck was in any profound sense "wrong," but
>rather that the passage from insight to application never quite seemed to
>happen.
>
>The concrete manifestation of Peck's approach was the Community Building
>programs that I, Glory, and thousands of others participated in. These
>programs were, as Glory correctly states, deeply moving, terribly
>disturbing, and very profound. Initially the participants were what I might
>call the cognoscenti - the searchers and thinkers who grooved on such
>things.  Eventually their application spread to the broader community, and
>there was considerable effort made to bring the enterprise into the
>corporate world - with some success. The impact was undeniable, but
>increasingly the niggling question arose - After the program, what do you
>do? Where do you go from here?
>
>It always seemed to remind me of the "T Group" experience emanating from
>such institutions as NTL (National Training Labs). Profound learning
>occurred at both a personal and general level concerning the function of
>groups. And major effort was dedicated to the transfer of this experience
>and learning into the life of organizations of all sorts, an effort that
>continues (NTL is, so far as I know, alive and well). But there was no
>denying that the processes utilized were detailed and controlling, almost to
>the point of tediousness. If we could only build effective interaction and
>productive community by going through all of this, it always seemed to me
>that it would be a cold day in hell before any useful result would be
>broadly present. The learning was powerful, the experience profound, the
>research of high caliber - but the broad application and impact was wanting.
>
>At approximately the same time the Scott Peck began writing, and somewhat
>after the T-Group phenomenon, Open Space Technology came into being. As you
>all know, OST did not arrive courtesy of careful research and endless field
>tests. It arose out of frustration, laziness and two martinis. But it worked
>in some remarkable ways, not all of which were immediately apparent. In fact
>it took some 5 years from inception (1985) to discover that not only was it
>productive and fun, but also that some serious positive human behaviors
>showed up - apparently all by themselves. I have characterized these as High
>Learning, High Play, Appropriate structure and control - and last, but by no
>means least - Genuine Community. I am not sure that Scott Peck actually uses
>the words Genuine Community, but it is a natural correlate to his
>"pseudo-community." And as near as I can remember, I used the phrase thanks
>to him. He taught me what to look for.
>
>The interesting thing is that in Open Space, Genuine Community seemingly
>happens all by itself. There are no community building exercises, extensive
>and (I would say) intrusive facilitator interventions, or carefully
>prescribed procedures and processes that the group involved must perform -
>unless you count sitting in a circle, creating a bulletin board, and opening
>a market place to be such a process. Perhaps even more remarkable, Genuine
>Community appears even under the most stressful and conflicted situations -
>to the point that it almost seems that the greater the initial conflict and
>stress the deeper and more profound the Genuine Community. And nobody does a
>thing - it just happens.
>
>After wallowing in this mystery for 10 years, it eventually dawned on this
>benighted soul that the obvious, clear, and probably only explanation is
>that Genuine Community is a naturally occurring function of a well dispose
>Self-Organizing system. Duh! Or put slightly differently - Community is a
>natural phenomenon which suffers greatly when space closes. So if you want
>Community, just open space. It would also seem clear that working hard at
>"creating community" is to a large extent a waste of time and energy.
>Community is what we naturally are - we need only to remove the barriers and
>constraint to its (community's) manifestation. And we do that by opening
>space.
>
>A long way around the barn to arrive at a simple point - which is - creating
>highly elaborate community building processes is, from where I sit, not
>likely to be very productive - especially since community seems to happen
>pretty well all by itself - given the space. However, the critical
>exploration and development of ways to leverage and amplify this natural
>occurrence would seem to be right on the money. Could in fact be the real
>Pot of Gold.
>
>Harrison
>
>
>
>Harrison Owen
>7808 River Falls Drive
>Potomac, Maryland   20845
>Phone 301-365-2093
>
>Open Space Training www.openspaceworld.com <http://www.openspaceworld.com/>
>
>Open Space Institute www.openspaceworld.org
>Personal website http://mywebpages.comcast.net/hhowen/index.htm
>OSLIST at LISTSERV.BOISESTATE.EDU
>To subscribe, unsubscribe, change your options, view the archives Visit:
>http://listserv.boisestate.edu/archives/oslist.html
>
>
>
>
>*
>*
>==========================================================
>OSLIST at LISTSERV.BOISESTATE.EDU
>------------------------------
>To subscribe, unsubscribe, change your options,
>view the archives of oslist at listserv.boisestate.edu:
>http://listserv.boisestate.edu/archives/oslist.html
>
>To learn about OpenSpaceEmailLists and OSLIST FAQs:
>http://www.openspaceworld.org/oslist

Séamus McInerney
50 Carrigdhoun, Waterpark, Carrigaline, Co. Cork
http://homepage.tinet.ie/~xroadsfac/

*
*
==========================================================
OSLIST at LISTSERV.BOISESTATE.EDU
------------------------------
To subscribe, unsubscribe, change your options,
view the archives of oslist at listserv.boisestate.edu:
http://listserv.boisestate.edu/archives/oslist.html

To learn about OpenSpaceEmailLists and OSLIST FAQs:
http://www.openspaceworld.org/oslist